When Angels Fall
by miettelaenvie
Summary: Another version of what happened at Reichenbach Falls.
1. Chapter 1

_The Captain's got his boots on and he's heading out the door  
>Leaving his lady alone, thinking 'He don't love me no more.'<br>He's done with all this bullshit, he's going back to war;  
>if heaven is as heaven does, then this is hell for sure.<em>

* * *

><p>Sherlock woke up with a start, bolting upright in bed. The hotel room was dark, the curtains drawn and the only light was a warm glow coming from a lamp on the desk by the window. He didn't remember falling asleep. He remembered last night, a drink with John, and then—he threw the covers off, searching for the note that was delivered to him yesterday, hoping he was wrong about the conclusion he'd drawn.<p>

_And then he had told John that Moriarty was back once more._

His brain was a mess, foggy, his thoughts barely able to form. He was reacting so slowly, the drug must still be in his system. But he'd had to have slept for hours… or not. His mind grew hazier and then sharp as he remembered waking up, seeing John at the desk, saying his name as he tried to get up, and John ushering him back into bed, giving him a glass-a glass of what? He can't remember the taste. Water? Most likely.

He never thought John would actually drug him, and he took a single second out of his search to think about the backbone in that action. Not that John Watson was a pushover, but he was a man conditioned to take orders. Living with Sherlock was helping him think for himself, obviously, but he also had morals that sometimes got in the way of things like this, of things like drugging someone, much less your partner, your friend. Sherlock gives a pause, slight appreciation for the fact that the John that he knows was able to overcome all of that for enough time to come to the conclusion of drugging him, and if Sherlock was correct, something far worse.

The note is gone, and he finds his phone under the bed, more likely where he dropped it in his sleep than an actual hiding place. It's half past two and when he pushes the curtains out of the way, the skies are growing grey, promising something foul. There was an envelope on the dresser across the room, and Sherlock grabbed it, heart starting to race at the 'Dear Sherlock,' in John's handwriting.

John had gone after Moriarty, a brave move on his part. Brave or stupid? Sherlock pressed his fingertips against his temples, thinking. Seconds were ticking past and he was losing time. It was obvious that Moriarty was planning to end him, he'd done that before and made it known that he would continue until Sherlock was dead—or until he stopped solving crimes, by which Sherlock would die of boredom so it still insured his death. But this time had been more final, the criminal didn't seem to be looking for a big show or a round of applause.

His mind was a mess but it was cleaning itself up. The note had said to meet somewhere, to "leave the doctor" out of it, though Sherlock had no intentions of involving John in the first place. But where, where was he supposed to go today? He was supposed to send John off in the way of a group of elderly women who had an excess of aches and pains that would keep him busy long enough for Sherlock to slip out, probably long enough to allow whatever was in store to happen. God, what drugs had John given him? He couldn't even think properly.

Sherlock left his coat, only pausing to grab his phone, to dial John's number as he ran down the hall of the hotel he and John had checked into days before. Hopefully he wasn't too late, he couldn't be too late, not on this. John wasn't picking up his phone, though Sherlock hadn't really expected him to, it was the cold feeling wrapping around his heart that led him to hope against all reason that the doctor would pick up, that he would hear John say 'Hello?' one more time, possibly even hundreds or thousands more.

He paused at the lobby, asked if anyone had seen the man that had been with him yesterday, and wasn't surprised when no one could help him. He tried to remember what else the note had said as he raced out onto the street. He had been distracted yesterday, a discussion with John about sentiment and its vast uselessness taking priority over his memory, and his fingers twitched as he remembered taking the note, opening it, but what did it_ say_?

His memory sputtered as he looked up, eyes resting on an advert for the 'scenic Reichenbach Falls.'

* * *

><p><em>Dear Sherlock,<em>

_I've gone to meet Moriarty, so don't wait up. There are a few older ladies that said you promised them a visit with me—you'll have to apologize for me, I don't think I'll make it._

_I've had the best times with you._

_Your Doctor,_  
><em>John Watson<em>

* * *

><p>John almost felt bad for slipping Sherlock something in his drink, a lot of somethings, but it was quickly stamped out by the feeling of knowing that Sherlock would most likely die today if John hadn't decided to take his place. He couldn't let that happen—he was an ordinary man, but Sherlock was extraordinary. The world could afford to lose an Army doctor, but there were very few Sherlock's. He felt a smile tug on the corner of his mouth, debating whether the world could handle many more people like Sherlock, whether the universe would simply collapse in on itself to shut the bastards up.<p>

John had had a decent life. An okay childhood, his time in the Army, the last part of his life here with Sherlock—it was better than most people get at all. He didn't regret a single part of it, even when the nightmares about his time in the war left him ill-rested, made his scar and leg ache. He'd leave a decent memory of himself, and that's all one could really ask for, isn't it? Maybe they'd have a little plaque for him, something along the lines of 'heroic deeds' or maybe 'died in service of Sherlock Holmes.' Someone would get a kick out of that one, at least.

The path was winding down, coming to a cliff at the falls. He'd supposed that this place was sectioned off from the public, which was a shame, really, the waterfall was right there, close enough to touch. Then a man in a suit stepped into view, and John felt his stomach drop, felt himself reach for his service pistol tucked in his waistband. He had no idea what was going to happen, of course, and to assume it was going to be bad may be presumptuous but then again he _was_ dealing with Moriarty.

The psychopath looked like he hadn't slept in days, his eyes red, his hair muffled. He looked tired as he tilted his head, his eyes darting around. "Ah, John. I thought Sherrrrrrrrrlock was leaving you behind." His voice was surprised, almost jealous as he drew out the name, and for a fleeting moment John had the urge to smile.

"Sherlock's not coming."

The criminal straightened his head, his jaw cocking to one side and then the next as he looked John over, letting out a bark of a laugh as he turned away. "Oh, Doctor, I see. You've come to take his place." The last few words are a yell, deafening over the sound of the waterfall, and John can see his hands balling into fists before relaxing again. Moriarty turned back to him, shrugging. "This was an event that required Sherlock. A replacement just won't do." His voice was almost apologetic under the annoyed overtones.

John took a step forward, and then another, fighting a war against himself. He couldn't let his breathing shake, he couldn't stumble, he couldn't look away. There was no going back now. He'd lived a decent amount of his life on a battlefield; this was no different. "It's going to have to." He drew out his pistol, aiming it at the other man's heart, and Moriarty laughed.

"You're going to shoot me?"

John narrowed his eyes and said nothing.

"Fine then," Moriarty stepped closer until the barrel of the gun was against the fabric of his suit, pressing against his chest, and John set his jaw, watching carefully as the criminal's face lit up in a smile. "Shoot me."

John paused, swallowed, blinked, and Moriarty's face contorted. Taking John's moment of indecision to punch the doctor in the face and grabbing the doctor's free hand, the criminal latched a handcuff around it. He laughed while John recovered, wiping at a split lip with the back of his hand, spitting excess blood onto the ground. He looked at the handcuff on his hand, following the chain to see the other cuff around Moriarty's own wrist.

_God, there was no getting out of this._

"No time for indecision, John."

He raised the pistol again, steadying his hand as he pressed the barrel against Moriarty's chest once again, and closed his eyes as he pulled the trigger.

_Forgive me, Sherlock,_ he thought in the moment it took for the chain linking him and Moriarty to go slack, and then he was being pulled down into the roar of the Falls.

* * *

><p><em>If I feel God judging me,<br>Well, I fell into the water, and now I'm free._


	2. Chapter 2

It'd been months, but every now and then (once a day at least) he thought about the note.

"_I've had the best times with you."_

Sherlock knew John had meant it, because he wouldn't waste those words. It also led to thinking about theories he had been entertaining before… before, suspicions he'd had concerning the little smile John would give when they'd get a new case, or the way his pulse accelerated when presented with a chase. John had enjoyed the crime scenes as much as he had, in a different way of course. He was in it for the challenge, the clues, hoping to find something to keep him from being bored. John liked the adrenaline, the working towards a "better" cause. Sherlock had already figured this out once, but with John being gone, he tended to forget.

_The only things I ever forget unintentionally were the things I want to remember most._

His thoughts were a lot more fractured lately—he was a lot more fractured lately. His mind was a mess of cracks held together by the driving need to be doing something, and he _had_ been doing something constantly, ever since…ever since, and he could feel that cold fear stirring a the back of his mind when his mind wasn't completely occupied. He dreaded becoming bored, because that's when he had nothing to think about except John and the absence of him. Sherlock had never had a problem with death, it was the best mystery with which to occupy his mind with, but John's was something he didn't want to think about.

_They'd never found his body, and that could drive a body mad._

He had started having hallucinations since John's disappearance. It was normal, part of the grieving stages, but they left him wrecked. They were the worst when he was bored, when the white snake of fear struck his mind, leaving his wits paralyzed as a vision of the doctor walked through the flat as if he'd never been gone. He'd broken down on the roof of St. Bart's after an insistent hallucination had followed him around for thirteen hours, leaving him on the fringes of the whiteness. "I don't want to delete you." he'd said, composure failing, and the hallucination that was John had smiled sympathetically. "Careful Sherlock, if I didn't know you I'd say you were almost being sentimental."

_I don't understand sentiment though. Do I?_

The John that wasn't John talked to him about things he already knew, about the events of that day's morgue visit or the contents of the paper. After a particularly bad day, Sherlock found himself in the bath, sitting in water that had gone from being so hot it had tinted his skin pink to a cold that made his flesh seem transparent for the highway of veins it brought out. The John that wasn't John was sitting across from the sink, tapping his cane against the floor, talking nonstop, saying more than the actual John would have said in a week in ten minutes. It hurt to listen to, to hear John's voice from a thing that was so very _not _John, and Sherlock shut his eyes and placed his hands over his ears, sinking into the cold water until he was submerged. The hallucination was gone when he emerged.

Sherlock had taken to saying "Please God let me live" unconsciously, usually at the most inopportune times. Lestrade had overheard him once, wrinkling his face in confusion. "But you don't believe in God," he'd said, and Sherlock had caught himself, stilled himself, shook his head. "Nothing, it's nothing." He'd said, and Lestrade had given Sherlock a look he pretended not to see, the concern on the Detective Inspector's face causing something in his throat to close up and the phrase he'd borrowed from the good doctor didn't make another appearance that day. Lestrade and Mrs. Hudson started checking up on him more often after that, and Mycroft had visited once, but they'd both just sat in silence.

Today Sherlock had been lucky, hadn't lost control over his vocal chords, and he was exhausted from keeping his mind away from anything that might trigger some sort of visit from the John that wasn't John, he was exhausted from being alive, from merely existing. He walked into 221 Baker Street, climbing the stairs slowly, his nose picking up the scent of something coming from upstairs. Someone in his flat was making toast and… tea? Mrs. Hudson was on holiday until next week. Lestrade—no, not Lestrade. Mycroft? He hadn't heard from his brother for weeks, which was odd if he thought about it, but he didn't want to think about it, not right now.

_None of the hallucinations had a smell before._

He cautiously climbed the steps, relaxing slightly when he heard John say, "Bugger this." as something splashed onto the floor. The John that wasn't John had a smell now, which Sherlock filed under things to think about later, crashing onto the sofa as if the melancholy surrounding him had given him extra gravity, pulling him downwards, leaving him stuck to the fabric of the cushions. "Hello, Sherlock." John said, a stirring sound indicating he was holding a cup of tea. Sherlock ignored him. Chamomile, but John never drank chamomile except for those nights when he was particularly glad to be back at the flat, like after that chase through the alleys where they'd both been almost run over.

"Can you even hear me?"

Sherlock pinched the bridge of his nose. It would be over soon, hopefully, if he could just get to sleep. But he just couldn't stand to hear the man in the kitchen with the chamomile tea speak again, he wasn't sure if he was strong enough to deal with a talkative one tonight. "Of course I can hear you. I can always hear you."

John tilted his head. "What do you mean, you can always hear me?"

The detective closed his eyes. That voice was getting to him—he didn't like this, he just wanted to reach unconsciousness and escape this. "Yesterday, and the day before, and the day before. You always talk, I always hear you. You say so much for a hallucination."

_Now let me go to sleep._

The flat smells so completely like John, that terrifyingly honest new facet to the hallucinations, and Sherlock can't stand the combination of soap and leather and the coconut-like scent that is distinctive to sunscreen, doesn't like it makes his chest feel like caving in. He'd rather have his humanity slipping through ice than be subjected to this feeling in his chest, and if he were an idiot he would think he was having a heart attack but as it was he knew his heart rate had just increased and the smell of John was making his stomach churn.

"You've been having hallucinations about me?"

Sherlock made a noncommittal noise.

"That's almost… _nice_."

Throwing his arm over his eyes, he ignored the conversation. After a few seconds he heard dishes being put in the sink and John's footsteps heading towards the door. "Right, then, I'm going to bed." There was a pause and a breath. "Do these hallucinations usually stay the night?"

Sherlock's mind, which had been growing dull with sleep, suddenly became sharp again, remembering all the times he'd woken up hoping for John's footsteps on the stairs or to see him sitting in his chair, reading the newspaper or updating his blog on some mundane experience. "No, never." John made a "hmph" sound, considering that, and said, "I'll see you tomorrow then." His footsteps were on the stairs, the ones leading up to his room, and Sherlock's eyes opened.

_Something is different._

It'd taken a few minutes to place. Dirt tracks on the floor, John's jacket on the back of his chair. He got up, crossing the living room to the kitchen, feeling the cup in the sink. Still warm. A towel thrown over the back of one of the kitchen chairs. Sherlock looked down the hall. The shower. He almost ran to the bathroom, seeing the pile of dirty clothes on the floor, the steam fading from the mirror, a phone on the counter. He picked it up, finding no lock on it, and went to the inbox. There were two messages, both bearing his brother's signature.

**YOU ARE IN GOOD CARE. I WILL BE SEEING YOU SOON. –MH**

**ALSO, DON'T TRY TO CONTACT SHERLOCK. TOO DANGEROUS. –MH**

Mycroft. This was an elaborate hallucination-but was it a hallucination? He weighed the phone in his hand. This felt too real. He sent a message to Mycroft, his thumbs flying over the phone's keyboard.

**IS HE REALLY ALIVE? –SH**

Within seconds a new messaged flashed onto the screen.

**ASK HIM YOURSELF. –MH**

Sherlock stared at the screen for a moment, then placed the phone carefully back where he had found it, moving backwards until he hit the wall, his breathing seeming too loud, the blood rushing in his ears almost deafening. His footsteps echoed vibrations through his body as he walked down the hall, gaining speed as he swung around the doorway and launched himself up the stairs, taking them two at a time and pushing John's door open. He stood there and stared at the doctor, who as sitting up in bed, blinking sleepily, and in one swift move Sherlock pounced on him.

"John!" he shouted, taking the doctor's face in his hands and turning it side to side, ignoring the other man's wide eyes at his examination.

"Sherlock," John said, sounding worried.

"It's you! You're alive; you're actually here."

John gave a strained smile. "So I'm not a hallucination, then?"

"No." Sherlock leaned back, studying John's face. "At least, I don't think so."

John furrowed his brow. "What happened to 'absolute certainty' and 'I'm never wrong'?"

Sherlock felt a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. He was talking to John and smelling John and John was in front of him and it all felt right, it all felt _real_, and it was making him almost giddy. "I'm _almost_ never wrong."

"Yes, well, you're also sitting on my legs."

His eyes narrowed. "You'll live. Where have you been?"

The doctor sighed. "Can't you deduce it? Downstairs? While I sleep?"

Sherlock winced as he remembered back to all those times he had walked out of a room the John that wasn't John had been in and come back to find him gone. "No."

"It's a bit of a long story." John looked at the clock beside his bed and Sherlock followed his gaze, turning the clock to face the wall.

"I've got time."


End file.
